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A starter with soft stuff who grew up in hard circumstances, Eddie Guardado improbably earned three postseason saves and made two All-Star teams as a reliever. Fans of the small-market Minnesota Twins embraced the underdog lefty with an alliterative nickname. “Everyday Eddie” – so called because he averaged more than 70 appearances per season from […]

He is, perhaps, the most exquisitely talented writer ever to focus sustained attention on the subject of baseball. Yet Roger Angell was never a “baseball writer” in the normal sense of the term. Instead, his work on baseball has been an extension of his keen observation and appreciation of the sport as a fan. Moreover, […]

He began his baseball life as the mascot of his college team, but the diminutive Ed Burns grew into a World Series catcher for the Philadelphia Phillies. On October 31, 18871, in San Francisco, Edward Aloysius Burns and his wife Louisa (née Schaufele) welcomed their only child. Edward James Burns. into the world. The elder Edward […]

Dave Cole, a gregarious right-hander who spent six seasons in the big leagues with the Braves, Cubs, and Phillies, was the kind of pitcher who has been frustrating scouts and managers for over a century: he couldn’t control the lively fastball and sharp curve that he possessed. Cole pitched only 237 2/3 innings in the […]

A star in basketball and track, he never played high school baseball. He played one year in college and had a losing record in four years in the minor leagues before being promoted to the majors. Yet Bill Henry had a 16-year career in the big leagues, played in a National League All-Star Game, and […]

Oscar Dugey, a utility player, was called “the luckiest kid in baseball” after playing on two straight pennant winners, in 1914 and 1915. One of the best infielders to come out of the Texas League in the 20th century’s first two decades, the 5-foot 8, 160-pound right-hander hit just .194 in 195 games during his […]

Jack Maguire signed a minor-league contract to play in the New York Giants system at the age of 18. Although he eventually ended up playing only 45 games for the Giants, mostly as a pinch-hitter or pinch-runner, Maguire brushed against baseball history. In May 1951 the Giants sent Maguire on waivers to the Pittsburgh Pirates. […]

In 1969 the expansion Seattle Pilots hired Eddie O’Brien as bullpen coach. His role was to assist manager Joe Schultz and pitching coach Sal Maglie. Asked at the start of the season to specifically describe his duties, O’Brien offered “Well, I look in to Sal or Joe, and they let me know when I’m supposed […]

Billy Jurges, a star shortstop for the Chicago Cubs (1931-1938, 1946-1947) and the New York Giants (1939-1945), played a part in Babe Ruth’s called home run during the 1932 World Series, and perhaps provided some of the inspiration behind Bernard Malamud’s novel The Natural and the movie by the same name. He helped prompt the […]

It almost seems as if everyone is short-changing Bibb Falk. Many articles describe him as “the man who replaced Joe Jackson.” Author William A. Cook used that same description when he wrote Falk’s biography in 2015. There are very few players who could literally replace Shoeless Joe. Falk should be recalled as a player who […]

Eddie Waitkus was a slick-fielding first baseman who in an 11-year big-league career for three teams batted a solid .285 and struck out only 204 times in 4,681 plate appearances. Although a fine ballplayer, he would today likely be little remembered but for what happened to him on June 14, 1949, in a room at […]

  “One of the greatest things the Red Sox ever did in all the years I’ve known them was when they brought Pop Popowski up here after 30 years in the minors working with young players and made him a coach. He’s one of the greatest baseball men I’ve ever known in this game.” — […]

Ponchatoula, Louisiana, in the 1930s was a small town that had suffered a number of lumber mills closing in the previous decade. By the 1930s, it was known primarily as a strawberry farming region. It was into this area that on October 2, 1934, Earl Lawrence Wilson was born. He later changed his name to […]

In 1941, the book on 23-year-old Eddie Pellagrini was as a “good field, no hit” shortstop. “[He] may not hit as well as [others] but he’s certainly a fine prospect … ‘Pellagrini is a faster fielder than [most],’” said San Diego Padres player-manager Cedric Durst. It thus came as a surprise five years later when […]

“Dr. Frederick L. Wood, Dentist, Dies Suddenly” announced the London (Ontario) Free Press on November 18, 1935.1 The obituary for the “well-known dentist” amounts to one unassuming paragraph. 2 Surprisingly, it makes no mention of his many and varied accomplishments in sports — including 13 games in major-league baseball in 1884-85 — music, and the […]

Ottawa’s Art “Doc” Hillebrand was a force to be reckoned with in what would be his final season before an arm injury cut short his career. Appearing in all 34 games, he posted an estimated 1.74 ERA and a 10-6 record, tying for the league lead in wins. His contributions extended beyond the mound, as […]

Baseballs were flying out of major-league ballparks in 1953. At the end of play on this Sabbath Day, the National League had smashed 1,008 home runs on the season. Batters needed to hit only 92 more to break the single-season mark, set in 1950.1 The Milwaukee Braves, who had moved from Boston in the offseason, […]

The annual drive for statistics to validate an otherwise disappointing season brought the Boston Braves to Philadelphia’s Shibe Park on September 6, 1952, for a twilight-night doubleheader with the Phillies. The Phillies entered the game in fourth place, but they were 13½ games behind the league-leading Dodgers. The Braves, playing to smallish crowds in Boston, […]

It was a Goliath vs. Goliath situation. On July 14, 1967, Eddie Mathews smacked the 500th home run of his career — a three-run shot off fellow future Hall of Famer Juan Marichal. The Baseball Hall of Fame inducted Mathews in 1978, Marichal five years later. Wearing a Houston Astros uniform after a storied 15-year […]

Cincinnati’s roots in professional baseball date to 1876, and the Queen City has seen a lot of baseball history—including the first major-league game to feature three members of the 500-home-run club. It happened on June 10, 2005, when Ken Griffey Jr. and the Cincinnati Reds hosted Sammy Sosa, Rafael Palmeiro, and the Baltimore Orioles in […]

Though the calendar had yet to turn to June, the Chicago Cubs and Milwaukee Braves were already having seasons to forget. Despite Glen Hobbie’s outdueling Warren Spahn in a 2-1 Cubs victory the day before on Memorial Day, Chicago was mired near the bottom of the league. The one club keeping the 15-29 Cubs out […]

Oh, how it rained. The day before the first World Series game ever hosted at Comiskey Park, the skies opened. The National League champion New York Giants had hoped for a practice that would have allowed them to acclimate themselves to the quirks of an unfamiliar ballpark. Instead, manager John McGraw kept his team at […]

One of baseball’s highest-regarded feats is the cycle: “A single, double, triple, and home run (not necessarily in that order) hit by a player in the same game.”1 In the history of major league baseball (1876–2023) there have been 351 documented regular-season cycles, including seven in the Negro Leagues.2 The distribution of the starting defensive […]

Milwaukee was ready for major-league baseball in 1953.  More than 10,000 people turned out for an open house at the ballpark on March 15, three days before the Braves’ move to Milwaukee was approved by the National League owners.    Another large crowd turned out on April 6 and braved sleet and cold just to […]